Yes, I broke it. Lots of times.

I've been taking a break from sim racing for the past few weeks. I tend to burn out when I race a lot, and I raced a lot through the summer and fall. Also, I had some real-world track time, and that tends to make sim racing, even iRacing, seem a little tame.

My friend Michael Fridmann runs a shop that specializes in maintaining and modifying Lotus street and race cars. He's got a Grand Am-prepared Lotus Esprit Twin Turbo V8 that he uses for track days, and he invited me to join him for two events at Loudon.

October 26

The Lotus is a ferocious beast, with a full roll cage, race suspension, and engine beefed up to put out somewhere around 750 HP at max boost and peak RPM. Michael has pegged back the performance a bit for longevity, but it's still a mighty fast machine.

The first day was...interesting. I went out in the first session and got a black flag after two laps. Seems the car was smoking badly going up the hill out of Turn Six. I brought it back to the garage (the same garages NASCAR uses when they run at NHMS) and Michael and his friend Ray Patriacca, who did a lot of the preparation of the car for this event, looked the car over. Everything looked fine so I went back out. Two laps, black flag. Again.

This time they jacked it up and took a very hard look. Ray found evidence of a small oil leak at the rear of the left head, just above the turbo. Apparently a threaded plug was leaking and dripping tiny amounts of oil onto the turbo - which produced copious amounts of smoke.

A quarter turn of an Allen wrench and a shot of Brakleen and we had no more smoke. Michael did some laps and said the car felt good, but it lacked grip. This is because the Hoosier tires were old and had way too many heat cycles in them. Also the car still has the springs and shock settings from when it was running in Grand Am - and carrying 800 pounds of lead ballast that is now stashed somewhere back at Michael's shop. So it's a little stiffly sprung at the moment.

I went back out and started to get some laps in. Great! Yes, it could have used more traction, but it still felt terrific. It's been a year since I've been on track, and this car is worth way more money than I could afford to fix it if I smack a wall somewhere (and NHMS has lots of those). I was carefully working my way up to speed when...I'm coming out of Six, accelerating up the hill, and suddenly the cockpit fills with smoke! Augh! Not again!

I hit the master switch to kill the engine and pull off to the left, onto the grass. They shut down the course and bring everybody in so the wrecker can come and pull me back to the paddock. It's a long, slow trip on the end of the tow rope; plenty of time to contemplate that it's the end of practice and everybody's lost track time because of me and my smoky Lotus.

Back in the garage, we can't find anything. No oil anywhere, no sign of a water leak. Engine runs fine, gauges all normal. Mystery.

Then during the break before the time trials start, Michael checks the brake lights and finds they aren't working. They're required by our club, COMSCC, but weren't required by Grand Am, so Michael and Ray had added them. Turned out that a wire at the brake pedal had fallen off. The connector at the end was uninsulated, and when it touched the floor, it had created a short circuit which melted the insulation. That's where the smoke had come from.

Ray replaces the wire and Michael and I do our time trial laps uneventfully. I manage a 1:24.0, which is way slower than the car's potential, but considering the four year old tires, the ultra-stiff suspension, and my own lack of current seat time, I'm pleased.

After the time trials there's plenty of time for open practice. I get in about six laps when, going up the hill out of Six, the cockpit fills with smoke. Again. This time it's much thicker and by the time I get the car stopped it's so dense I can't breathe. I'm still coughing when the safety people arrive, and after another long tow back to the paddock the ambulance shows up and they convince me to breathe some pure oxygen for a while. To my surprise, this helps clear my head.

Turns out the new wire fell off and did the same thing as the old one. My heeling and toeing into Six is getting my feet into places Ray and Michael never anticipated, and eventually my toe snags the wire and pulls it off the connector. It falls down, shorts itself out and burns up. Since this new wire was thicker with more insulation, there was more smoke. Doh!

November 1

We had a week till the next event, so Ray and Michael had time to fix the brake wire properly. For this event Ray was my student. He's got plenty of oval racing experience, having won a local championship a couple of years ago, but this was going to be his first time on a road course.

I take him out in the car for the early morning instructor session. It's very cold, having dropped below freezing the night before, and this is a light car on big four year old race tires that are now very, very hard. I'm tiptoeing around, trying to get some warmth into them, hoping Ray wasn't too bored. (He wasn't!)

After six laps I'm feeling a little more confident, sensing some grip coming, and I start to lean on it just a little. Out of Turn Ten I squeeze on the power, being careful not to spin the rear tires but giving it a bit more than before, when the engine suddenly zings up toward redline and a big vibration hammers through the car. I shut it down and put my fist out the window to signal the cars behind that I'm headed for the pit entrance, just a couple corners ahead.

My first thought is that I've broken the transmission, but when I turn left to go around the corner the left rear of the car sits down and the vibration changes into a scraping noise. I pull off the asphalt and peer into my outside mirror. I can just see the left rear tire - lying on the grass about 20 feet behind the car. The Lotus is done for the weekend.

No tow rope this time; we (and everyone else who is hoping to be on the track about now) have to wait while the flatbed guy figures out how to get a three wheeled Lotus up onto the flatbed without ripping it to shreds.

Back at the garage, Michael directs the unloading of the Lotus from the flatbed right onto his trailer while I start hoofing it around the garage, looking for someone that will let a road course rookie drive their car so Ray's weekend won't be a total bust.

Finally a very generous Dan Baldwin allows me to take Ray out in Dan's showroom stock Honda S2000. This car is tailhappy like no other street car I've ever driven, but we get in some good laps. As we're getting out of the car in Dan's garage, right next to us Lou Milanazzo is strapping his helmet on, about to get into his ferocious black Dodge Shelby GLH. I ask him if he'll take Ray out and he says sure. Great! More track time for Ray, even if it is in the right seat.

Meanwhile Michael has gotten the Lotus squared away on the trailer, diagnosed the problem as a broken stub axle, and tracked down a drive for Ray: Marc Epstein's fire-breathing race-prepared Honda S2000.

Ray's first laps in the Honda are anything but tentative. First lap, over the hill at eight, he's flat out at maybe 80 MPH and headed straight for a wall he can't yet see until my frantic gestures get him to brake - just in time. On the second lap, going up the hill through seven, the tail steps out and Ray corrects. A wild series of tankslappers ensues. For a moment I think he's caught it, but it gets away from him and spins up the hill, coming to a stop on the right side of the track, tail off in the gravel, up against the tire wall.

In the right side mirror can see the bumper buried in the tire wall and I'm hoping desperately that any damage we've done is purely cosmetic. Marc is locked in a tight battle for the championship and the time trial this afternoon will be the title decider. I really hope we aren't responsible for him losing!

In the pits we get the all clear and Ray's subsequent laps are a little more circumspect. Back in the paddock we inspect the rear of the car. It's perfect. Not a scratch. No, wait, there are a few tiny, tiny scratches on the rear bumper where the grit on the tires in the tire wall scraped the paint. Whew! Close call!

The rest of the afternoon is relatively uneventful, except that my brother Nate lets me drive his latest project, the Bio-Diesel Special.

What a hoot! Feels almost like a shifter kart with fenders, except that you don't have to shift because the hot rodded four cylinder diesel (from a VW New Beetle) has so much torque. Good thing, too, because the shifter is so loose it feels like it's broken (but it isn't). Great brakes, steering, terrific handling, endless acceleration. Sweet machine.

Late in the afternoon Michael and Ray and I are standing around and a thought occurs to me. I've been assuming the Lotus is done for the weekend, but maybe...

Yes! Michael has been thinking the same thing. He's got a spare halfshaft (which includes the stub axle) back at the shop, plus a spare wheel bearing and spare brake lines. He's confident he and Ray can fix the car for the next day.

November 2

Sure enough, in the morning they're back at the track, car ready to go. Awesome! Ray finally is going to get a shot at driving the monster Lotus at speed.

Things go well for a few laps, but then Ray goes into Three a little hot and spins again. As he turns in I can feel it coming; the Lotus is extremely tail-happy and the ancient tires just don't have the grip Ray's asking for. Nothing I can do but wait for the spin to end; fortunately we spin harmlessly, keeping off the wall at the outside of Three, and everybody gets by us without hitting anything. I tell Ray, "I don't want to see any more spins!" And I don't.

Now another problem begins to rear its head: overheating. The Lotus had this problem all through the summer of '07. We'd get in one session with the engine running cool, temps low and stable, but in the second session the engine would start steaming and the water temp would go through the roof. We'd bring it in, wait for it to cool, and Michael would carefully top it up with coolant. We'd get another session of running cool and then the overheating would come back.

To address this, during the previous weeks he'd pressure tested the system and found and fixed a number of small leaks, mostly caused by hose clamps that had loosened up as the hoses had compressed. The fixes had worked for the first two days, but now that we were running it hard and long the problem was back.

It seemed to bite me the worst. Michael got in a nice long run; temps stayed down. I got in the car, and three laps later I was coming back in on the rope - again - after having shut it down when steam filled the cockpit. Michael and Ray both got clear runs in their time trials, but for me it overheated at the end of one lap and I had to pull off, missing out on what should have been faster timed laps.

Finally we got the procedures down and in the open practice at the end of the day I got in a nice series of laps, but I was never quite able to match my best time from the previous weekend. The colder weather combined with tires which get worse with every heat cycle were probably at least partly to blame.

In the end my only time trial lap was good enough for second in class. Micheal and Ray set good times as well. Nate won his class, Dan Baldwin won his class, and Marc Epstein won his class and his championship. Of those who helped us out, only Lou Milinazzo didn't come away with a win; instead the poor guy DNF'd. Thanks to all of you guys; good karma's coming your way - especially Lou.

Ray did a great job in his first time on a road course - and I'm pretty sure he enjoyed himself!

Despite the troubles it was a great three days and a reminder of how terrific it is to be at a race track, driving fast and having fun.

Respectfully submitted,

The Racing Addict